The Chelsea Flower Show Today
The Chelsea Flower Show receives a lot of publicity. It is attended by 157,000 visitors each year (a number limited by the capacity of the 11-acre (45,000 m2) ground), and all tickets must be purchased in advance. From 2005 the show was increased from four days to five, with the first two days only open to RHS members. The show is extensively covered on television by the BBC. An official DVD of the show is produced on behalf of the RHS by Twofour. Several members of the British Royal Family attend a preview of the show, as part of the royal patronage of the RHS. The area of land devoted to show gardens increased steadily between 1970 and 2000 and the show has become an important venue for watching trends. New plants are often launched at the show and the popularity of older varieties revived under the focus of the horticultural world. It is the garden design equivalent of a catwalk at a fashion show.
Highlights from the 2011 RHS Chelsea Flower Show includes The Irish Sky Garden by Diarmuid Gavin based on the idea of a restaurant in the sky. Other show stopping gardens included the HESCO Garden, by Leeds City Council who reconstructed an impressive and idyllic working water wheel in the grounds of the Royal Hospital.
The 2011 show also saw the introduction of the new Artisan garden category which featured beautiful artistic and natural gardens.
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“Gather ye rose-buds while ye may,
Old Time is still a-flying:
And this same flower that smiles to-day,
To-morrow will be dying.”
—Robert Herrick (1591–1674)
“Nothing to be done really about animals. Anything you do looks foolish. The answer isn’t in us. It’s almost as if we’re put here on earth to show how silly they aren’t.”
—Russell Hoban (b. 1925)
“But today I set the bed afire
and smoke is filling the room,
it is getting hot enough for the walls to melt,
and the icebox, a gluey white tooth.
I have on a mask in order to write my last words,
and they are just for you....”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)